Community Adaptation and Vulnerability in Arctic Regions

Arctic communities are experiencing global, societal and economic pressures, and environmental changes. This book details the conditions that contribute to vulnerabilities, identifies adaptive strategies and assesses the prospects for adaptation in the future.

The 'Year' That Changed How We View the North This book is about a new theoretical approach that transformed the field of Arctic social studies and about a program called International Polar Year 20072008 (IPY) that altered the position of social research within the broader polar science. The concept for IPY was developed in 20032005; its vision was for researchers from many nations to work together to gain cro- disciplinary insight into planetary processes, to explore and increase our understanding of the polar regions, the Arctic and Antarctica, and of their roles in the global system. IPY 20072008, the fourth program of its kind, followed in the footsteps of its predecessors, the first IPY in 18821883, the second IPY in 19321933, and the third IPY (later renamed to 'International Geophysical Year' or IGY) in 19571958. All earlier IPY/IGY have been primarily geophysical initiatives, with their focus on meteorology, atmospheric and geomagnetic observations, and with additional emphasis on glaciology and sea ice circulation. As such, they excluded socio-economic disciplines and polar indigenous people, often deliberately, except for limited ethnographic and natural history collection work conducted by some expeditions of the first IPY. That once dominant vision biased heavily towards geophysics, oceanography, and ice-sheets, left little if any place for people, that is, the social sciences and the humanities, in what has been commonly viewed as the 'hard-core' polar research.

Documents and assesses the nature of vulnerability in communities across the entire Arctic Interdisciplinary research approach Demonstrates the importance of a shared analytical framework for comparing results across case studies Empirical examples of vulnerabilities and adaptive strategies from a region of the world commonly viewed as having high susceptibility to climate change

Texte du rabat
Arctic communities are experiencing global, societal and economic pressures coupled with additional environmental changes. The comparison of local and indigenous observations with instrumental records clearly illustrates how Arctic communities, both now and in the past, have adapted to a variety of changes and risks affecting their livelihoods. Projections of future climate change indicate a further reduction in sea ice extent and stability, change to the frequency and intensity of weather events and seasonal transition, alteration in the abundance and distribution of fish and terrestrial biodiversity, and lessening permafrost stability. All these factors will affect Arctic resident's livelihoods and wellbeing. Under the auspices of the International Polar Year 2007-2008 (IPY), the CAVIAR consortium was formed with partners from all eight Arctic countries as a response to the need for systematic assessment of community vulnerabilities and adaptations across the Arctic. The aim of the interdisciplinary CAVIAR project is to increase understanding of the vulnerability of Arctic communities to changing societal and environmental conditions, including climate change. Presented in this volume are the results and accomplishments drawn from the partnership with local collaborators from fifteen Arctic communities. In each of the case studies researchers have documented the conditions and forces that exacerbate or diminish vulnerabilities in each of the case studies, identified previous and current adaptation strategies, and assess the prospects for the development of effective adaptive strategies and policies in the future.

Contenu
to the CAVIAR Project and Framework.- Adaptation in Fisheries and Municipalities: Three Communities in Northern Norway.- Vulnerability and Adaptation in Two Communities in the Inuvialuit Settlement Region.- Climate Change, Vulnerability and Adaptation Among Nenets Reindeer Herders.- Vulnerability of Community Infrastructure to Climate Change in Nunavut: A Case Study From Arctic Bay.- 'Translating' Vulnerability at the Community Level: Case Study From the Russian North.- 'As Long as the Sun Shines, the Rivers Flow and Grass Grows': Vulnerability, Adaptation and Environmental Change in Deninu Kue Traditional Territory, Northwest Territories.- Case Study Photographs.- The Ivalo River and its People: There Have Always Been Floods What Is Different Now?.- Climate Change and Institutional Capacity in an 'Arctic Gateway' City: A CAVIAR Case Study of Whitehorse.- Climate Change Vulnerability and Food Security in Qeqertarsuaq, Greenland.- Climate Change, Vulnerability and Adaptive Capacity in a Multi-use Forest Municipality in Northern Sweden.- Local Effects of Global Climate Change: Differential Experiences of Sheep Farmers and Reindeer Herders in Unjárga/Nesseby, a Coastal Sámi Community in Northern Norway.- Community Adaptation and Vulnerability Integrated.